(www.clevelandurbannews.com) / (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com)

Warrensville Heights, OH-  11th Congressional District Congresswoman Marcia L. Fudge (OH-11), a Warrensville Heights Democrat and chair of the Congressional Black Caucus of Blacks in Congress, commented yesterday on the passing of Civil Rights advocate and longtime Call and Post associate publisher and editor-in-chief Constance "Connie" Harper, who died Friday at the age of 81.

“Throughout her life Constance D. Harper used her gifts as a journalist, newspaper executive and civic leader to benefit the community and improve the lives of the most vulnerable among us," said Fudge. "Though we mourn the loss of Ms. Harper, we give thanks for her many contributions that have enriched so many people in Cleveland and throughout the state of Ohio."

Fudge said that Harper was a strong yet compassionate voice to enlighten, inform and entertain and that "she also gave freely of her leadership skills, serving on the boards of numerous civic organizations in Cleveland.”

The federal lawmaker said also that Harper will be missed and offered condolences on behalf of the constituents of the 11th congressional district, which is largely Black and includes the predominantly Black city of Cleveland and its eastern suburbs in Cuyahoga County, and a pocket of the city of Akron and staggering segments of its Summit County suburbs.

“On behalf of the citizens of the 11th congressional district of Ohio, I extend my sincere condolences to her [Connie Harper's] beloved sisters, and to her entire family, friends, her extended family at the Call and Post,  and to her Alma mater, Central State University," said Fudge.

By  Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief, Cleveland Urban News. Com and The Cleveland Urban News.Com Blog, Ohio's Most Read Online Black Newspaper and Newspaper Blog. Tel: 216-659-0473. (Kathy Wray Coleman is a 20-year investigative and political journalist and legal reporter who trained for 17 years under five different editors at the Call and Post Newspaper, Ohio's most prominent Black press)

(www.clevelandurbannews.com) / (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com)

(Editor's note: Cleveland Urban News.Com led all media in breaking the story on the death of Connie Harper. Cleveland Urban News.Com salutes Cleveland journalism legend Constance "Connie" Harper)

CLEVELAND, Ohio- Civil Rights advocate and longtime Call and Post Newspaper Assoc Publisher and Exec Editor Constance "Connie" Harper (pictured) died Friday at a Dayton, Ohio hospital where she was on life support after suffereing a heart attack. She was 81.

Funeral arrangements are pending.

Harper fail ill on Sunday at the homecoming of Central State University, which is located in Xenia, a city some 21 miles outside of Dayton. She was the Cleveland alumni chapter president for CSU, Ohio's only historically Black public college or university.

Family members, including her  sister, retired Ohio Eighth District Court of Appeals judge Sara J. Harper, and their sister Gloria, and close nieces, nephews and cousins visited Harper in Dayton. They had hoped that she could be flown by helicopter back to Cleveland, but fate had it otherwise.

Connie Harper was a sister-in-law of retired Cleveland Municipal Court judge George Trumbo, Sara Harper's longtime husband.

Born and raised in Cleveland, Harper graduated from John Adams High School in Cleveland and went on to earn a bachelor's degree in elementary education from CSU, where she was the editor of the student newspaper. She was the youngest of five female siblings, two of them deceased.

Harper was a major voice in Cleveland's African American community since the early 1960s. That's when she began writing for the paper and eventually became the editor under the late Call and Post  publisher W.O. Walker. She also hosted a talk show on WJMO, a local radio station.

She was a former elementary school teacher for the Cleveland Municipal School District and later worked in the international boxing arena promoting fights as vice p[resident for  Don King Productions, a boxing promotion company owned and operated by international boxing promoter Don King. She worked for the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections before rejoining the Call and Post in 1998 when King became owner and  publisher.

Harper, as editor, and King, as publisher, were the first of the more the 215 African-American newspapers of the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA) to endorse now President Barack Obama, America's first Black president.

Harper was a staunch advocate of civil and human rights and knew most of the NNPA publishers, some of them of whom are millionaires. She was at one time an officer of the Black influential media organization, which has championed Obama and visited the president and First Lady Michelle Obama at the White House per Obama's special invitation.

Harper was a member of the Old Black Political Guard and was among those that help elect the late Carl B. Stokes as mayor of Cleveland in 1967, the first Black mayor of a major American city. She grew up on Cleveland's largely Black east side near King and the Stokes brothers, Louis Stokes of whom ultimately became the first Black congressman from Ohio, a post now held by 11th Congressional District Congresswoman Marcia L. Fudge.

The Civil Rights pioneer, who was a moderate Republican with bi-partisan influence,  published Call and Post articles consequential to the Black community, including on police brutality, racial discrimination, education, Black empowerment, and the election of Obama as president in 2008, and his reelection in 2012. She received numerous awards and commendations and in 2010 accepted the Thomas Morgan III Award for AIDS/HIV awareness from the Atlanta based Center for Disease Control and the California-based Black AIDS Institute for the Call and Post, Ohio's oldest and most prominent Black Newspaper with distributions in Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati.

Harper was honored by the Cleveland Chapter of 100 Black Men earlier this month and was scheduled to attend a Nov. 7 gala by the Cleveland Press Club to be inducted into the Cleveland Journalism Hall of Fame with four others, including former Cleveland Fox 8 News anchor Wilma Smith, and 19 Action News Reporter Paul Orlousky,

Harper was a friend of the Rev Al Sharpton, and knew the Rev Jesse Jackson Sr., both of whom are prominent Civil Rights activists. She was also an active member of Olivet Institutional Baptist Church in Cleveland, and was a member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Inc.

Pictured is convicted serial killer Anthony Sowell
From the Metro Desk of Cleveland Urban News. Com and The Cleveland Urban News.Com Blog,Ohio's Most Read Online Black Newspaper and Newspaper Blog, Ohio'sleaders in Black digital news

(www.clevelandurbannews.com) / (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com)

(BRING SIGNS AND WEAR SHIRTS SYMBOLIZING YOUR ORGANIZATION TO THE RALLY AND VIGIL)

CLEVELAND, Ohio- The Imperial Women Coalition, The Laura Cowan Foundation, Sister to Sister, The Carl Stokes Brigade, The Oppressed People's Nation, Stop Targeting Ohio's Poor, The Greater Cleveland Committee for Community Empowerment and Educational Progress and other community activist groups, victims family members, Imperial Avenue residents, Black and other elected officials, and others will hold The Fifth Anniversary of the Imperial Avnuee Murders and Stop the Violence and Find the Missing Rally and Vigil in cooperation with National Domestic Violence month on Wednesday, Oct 29, 2014 at 4:00  pm on the corner of  East 123rd St and  Imperial Ave. (Editor's note: The meeting site is next to the since demolished home of serial killer Anthony Sowell. From downtown Cleveland take Kinsman Ave to East 123rd St, turn left, and proceed two blocks to Imperial Avenue with the home next to the corner. Call the Imperial Women Coalition at 216-659-0473 for more information).

THE THEME OF THE FIFTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE IMPERIAL AVENUE MURDERS RALLY AND VIGIL IS "REMEMBERING THE IMPERIAL AVENUE WOMEN THROUGH UNITY AND SOLIDARITY AND BY CALLING FOR AN END TO VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN  AND FOR ANTHONY SOWELL'S  CONVICTIONS TO BE UPHELD BY THE OHIO SUPREME COURT AND OTHERWISE"

At the rally community activists will say whether as much has been done as possible through changes in public policy and best practices by law enforcement and other officials in Cleveland and greater Cleveland to protect women, Black women in particular, against unnecessary rape, murder and other violence.

A former marine who served 15 years in prison for attempted rape before the serial murders,  Sowell, 55, was convicted in 2011 by a Cuyahoga County jury on 82 of 83 counts, including multiple counts of aggravated murder of the 11 women that he murdered at his since demolished home on Imperial Ave in Cleveland, Ohio, and  the rape of three other Black women. The coward of a serial killer begged for his life before he was sentenced to death by county judge Dick Ambrose. He sits on death row while his convictions are on appeal before the Ohio Supreme Court and his lawyers are seeking either a new trial or that his convictions are overturned. They claim that their serial killer client was denied a fair trial, and are being supported by the American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio (Ohio ACLU).

Sowell's lawyers and the Ohio ACLU argue that Sowell's  Sixth Amendment right to a public trial and the public's First Amendment right to attend the trial were violated when Judge Ambrose shut the public and the media out of voir dire, or the seating phase for the jury, and out of the suppression hearing, in spite of allegations of police misconduct. Case law, however, does not necessarily make access to a public trial absolute, particularly in some cases involving rape, juveniles, and those with security risks. But Sowell's attorneys and the ACLU say that Ambrose could have chosen a less restrictive means and did not follow other established criteria to shut out the press and the public.

Whether Sowell was prejudiced to the extent that his convictions and death sentence will be overturned or that a new trial will be ordered by the high court remains to be seen. Activists say it was harmless error, if any, particularly since Sowell admitted to the murders at trial, though only at the sentencing phase where he took the stand after not during so at trial.

Prosecutors argue that Sowell's appeal is essentially frivolous.

"A new trial would be a disgrace to the community," said community activist Mary Seawright.

"We are against a new trial and his convictions should be upheld," said community activist and domestic violence survivor Laura Cowan.

"If Anthony Sowell were in the bible days, they would nail him to the cross, " said community activist and rape victim Christine Wilson.

"He slept at sentencing, so let him sleep on when his convictions and his death sentenced are upheld," said community activist Ada Averyhart.

"We will be there to memorialize the women that Sowell was convicted by a jury of his peers of murdering, and to push for justice in this matter," said community activist Valerie Robinson.

"Our family will be there and they need to do more to find our mother's killer," said Angelique Malone, whose mother is among three women murdered near East 93rd Street and Besssemer Avenue on Cleveland's largely Black east side in 2013.

"We do not believe that there were any reversible errors at the trial court level that merit a new trial and that admitted serial killer Anthony Sowell had effective assistance of counsel, and we call for the Ohio Supreme Court to uphold his convictions and his death sentence," said community activist Kathy Wray Coleman. "If the issue is judicial wrongdoing or police misconduct relative to the murders and the trial then take the judge to the bar, seek criminal charges against the police, and call for an investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice, but by no means should the high court overturn his convictions or grant him a new trial."

"This violence against women has got to stop," said community activist Dick Peery

Rally speakers to date include the following:  Victims of crime, including their family members, including Angelique Malone and Imperial Avenue affiliates, CNN Hero and Domestic Violence Survivor and Advocate Laura Cowan, Cleveland Ward 6 Councilwoman and Women's Rights Advocate Mamie Mitchell, Cleveland Ward 4 Councilman Kenneth Johnson, State Representative Bill Patmon (D-10), retired Plain Dealer reporter Dick Peery,  Underground Railroad Leader Dr. Eugene Jordan, Fairfax Business Association Member Mary Seawright, Peace In The Hood Leader Khalid Samad,  Imperial Women Leader Kathy Wray Coleman, Oppressed People's Nation Chairman Ernest Smith , Stop Targeting Ohio's Poor Leaders Dr. Stuart Robinson and Valerie Robinson, The Rev Pamela Pinkney Butts, Black on Black Crime Founder Art McKoy, and Greater Cleveland Committee for Community Empowerment and Educational Progress Leaders Alethea Thomas and Erica Robinson.

(www.clevelandurbannews.com) / (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com)

(Editor's note: Cleveland Urban News.Com led all media in breaking the story on the death of Connie Harper. Cleveland Urban News.Com salutes Cleveland journalism legend Constance "Connie" Harper)

CLEVELAND, Ohio- The family of Call and Post Assoc. Publisher and Exec. Editor Connie Harper released a statement today on the death of the Civil Rights advocate and longtime editor of Ohio's oldest and most prominent Black newspaper.

Harper 81,  of suburban Cleveland, died Friday at a Dayton, Ohio hospital after falling into a coma after becoming ill on Sunday at the homecoming of her Alma mater, Central State University.

"It is with great sadness and a heavy heart that I announce the death of my aunt, Constance (Connie) Harper, associate publisher and editor of the Call and Post Newspaper," said Adam Trumbo, 44, Harper's nephew and one of the five grown children of Harper's sister, Sara J. Harper, a retired Ohio Eighth District Court of Appeals Judge, and her husband, George Trumbo, a retired Cleveland Municipal Court judge.

"She passed away last night surrounded by family and close friends," the press release also says.

"My mother, Judge Sara J. Harper, I, and the entire Harper-Trumbo family would like to thank the doctors, nurses and staff at Miami Valley Hospital for the care and concern that they showed my aunt and our family during this most difficult time," the younger Trumbo said.

Trumbo went on to say that Harper's family is "humbled by the outpouring of love, support and prayers we have received from the nation."

"My aunt’s greatest joy was sharing with others the success, concerns and struggles of Cleveland’s Black community as associate publisher and editor of the Call and Post Newspaper," said Trumbo.

Funeral arrangements are pending, though it is likely that Harper's funeral will be at the prestigious Olivet Institutional Baptist Church on Cleveland's east side where she was an active member.

A spokesperson for the family told Cleveland Urban News.Com that the family will release another statement on Harper in coming days.

Harper is also survived by another sister, and a host of nephews, nieces, cousins, close friends and associates.

(www.clevelandurbannews.com) / (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com)

CLEVELAND, Ohio- Beloved Call and Post Newspaper Assoc.Publisher and Exec. Editor Connie Harper (pictured), 81, is currently hospitalized in Dayton, Ohio after falling ill on Sunday at the homecoming of Central State University. Harper is also the CSU Cleveland chapter alumni president

CSU is Ohio's only historically Black public college or university.

The family is requesting privacy , a press release said.

Raised in Cleveland and the youngest of five female siblings, two of them deceased, Harper has been a major voice in Cleveland's African American community since the early 1960s. That's when she began writing for the paper under the late Call and Post  publisher W.O. Walker, and hosted  a teen talk show on WJMO, a local radio station. She is a former elementary school teacher who worked in the national boxing arena for international boxing promoter Don King and others. She worked for the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections before rejoining the Call and Post in 1998 when King became owner and publisher.

Harper,  as editor, and King, as publisher,  were the first of the more than 215 African-American newspapers of the National Newspaper Publisher Association to endorse now President Barack Obama, America's first Black president.

Harper has national contacts. She  is a friend of the Rev Al Sharpton, and knows the  Rev Jesse Jackson Sr., both of whom are prominent Civil Rights activists. She is also an active member of Olivet Institutional Baptist Church in Cleveland, and is a member of Delta, Sigma Theta Inc.

Family members, including her sister, retired Ohio Eighth District Court of Appeals judge Sara J. Harper, and their sister Gloria, and close nieces, nephews and cousins, are or have been visiting Harper in Dayton.

Harper is a sister-in-law of retired Cleveland Municipal Court judge George Trumbo, Sara Harper's longtime husband.